The field of the invention is that of packaging for containing and shipping objects and, in particular, substantially planar objects requiring more protection than traditional packing materials, especially conventional corrugated cartons.
Framed artwork such as paintings and prints are typically substantially planar (but three-dimensional) objects. In form, they resemble the ideal solids known as right rectangular parallelepipeds (one dimension being considerably less than the other two). Other shapes are known, however, such as cylinders (of wide radius and low height) and prisms (having polygon bases such as triangles and a low height). This range of solids, which are thinner in one dimension compared to the other two, will be referred to hereafter as "substantially planar objects," and may include any object having these forms and not just artwork. Mirrors, for example, would be included in the category "substantially planar objects." For convenience, the discussion of the art and the preferred embodiments will focus on artwork although the invention is to be understood as not being limited to packaging for artwork.
When artwork is shipped, as from a gallery to a customer's home, from one gallery to another or museum to museum, it should be packaged in order to protect it from harm. Such harm may result from impact forces due to droppage and ripping and tearing forces due to handling and stacking. Damage from water or other fluids must be prevented. The artwork must be protected from dirt, dust, vibration, and scratching. Artwork with glass needs special protection from breakage. Therefore, packaging must be provided to protect the artwork from these dangers.
A number of packaging systems are currently used for shipping artwork, including the common corrugated cardboard carton. When using cartons, the artwork must be protected from external forces by wrapping the artwork with some type of protective covering, usually bubblewrap (plastic sheeting formed with air bubbles trapped between the sheets). This system is limited by the size and shape of the available cardboard carton, i.e., the carton cannot adapt or conform to the art being shipped. It either fits or it does not and a wide variety of cartons are not economically and readily available for artwork. Moreover, this method offers only marginal protection against vibration and shock encountered when the package is dropped or mishandled.
Consequently, most artwork, especially valuable artwork, is crated for shipment. A wooden crate is literally built around the bubblewrapped piece(s). Packaging of this sort is costly, heavy, and suffers from the disadvantage of having to be tailor-made for each piece of artwork. Nevertheless, the art industry has tolerated the high cost and other difficulties associated with this packaging system in order to provide the level of protection necessary for expensive artwork. No system is currently available which can easily and cheaply accommodate the virtual infinite variety of sizes and thicknesses of commercially available artwork.
Expanded plastic is durable, waterproof, light, shock absorbent, and inexpensive. In more rigid densities and when reinforced, it is also reusable. Expanded plastic in softer densities has been used to protect other objects such as cameras, lenses, video equipment, etc. and occasionally molded poly styrene "corners" are placed over the corners of artwork for protection. But these uses invariably employ a separate external shipping container. The external shipping container is most often a corrugated carton. Occasionally, as disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,750,871, polystyrene may be used in conjunction with another, more rigid material (in this case, fiberboard). It is the fiberboard which provides the basic structural integrity of the container. The polystyrene is used as end caps for the shipping tube. Other examples of containers employing expanded plastic are U.S. Pat. No. 3,491,914, U.S. Pat. No. 4,386,702, and U.S. Pat. No. 4,542,822.
These examples of the use of expanded plastic for packaging systems have drawbacks when applied to substantially planar objects such as artwork. For example, artwork comes in various sizes and a packaging system should be capable of accommodating artwork within a range of sizes in order to be useful to the customer. Therefore, expanded plastic packaging systems which are shaped to fit an object of specific size and shape would be of limited value.
A packaging system for artwork should also be waterproof, and it should provide for absorption of impact forces in order to protect the delicate artwork contained in the packaging. The packaging system should be durable in order to be capable of reuse and, furthermore, should be easy to use. Packaging and unpackaging the artwork should be quick, easy, and should not require the use of too many tools, and should be simple and not require any special training. The ideal packaging system should be inexpensive, lightweight, strong, and reusable, if possible. It must be able to adjust or adapt to the virtual infinite range of commercially available sizes and thicknesses of wall artwork and be economically produceable for custom needs such as lamps, vases, crystal and the like.